“You can’t separate the person from the career. It doesn’t matter that there are good cops.” So says Aneesah Shealey, a student at DePaul University, quoted in Tuesday’s Tribune. Fortunately, the administration at Depaul recognizes that part of a college education is learning that not everything is black in white, not every position should be absolute.

What is this all about? Some students at Depaul object to DePaul offering educational programs to–Oh My God– officers of the Chicago Police Department! These programs include a Master of Jurisprudence Degree in Criminal Law, a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Business Administration, and a Writing Fellows Program. The courses are taught at the Police Academy, not on the DePaul Lincoln Park campus.

It would seem to me that officers familiar with the law would be more likely than more legally naive ones to treat the citizens of Chicago fairly and respect their rights. It would seem to me that those officers who are schooled in the nuances of management would eventually rise in the ranks and provide positive leadership. It would seem to me that officers enrolled in a writing program would be open to the world of literature and the arts, and be most likely to embrace the diversity of humanity.

And it seems to me that Shealey and friends, instead of trying to get the programs banned, could fight for the programs to be as good as they can be. The students could insist that the curriculum includes an emphasis on diversity,  the recognition of human rights, and the danger of bias.  They could advocate that the courses could be on one of DePaul’s campuses so that students and officers could mingle and try to understand what makes their opposite numbers tick.

But according to Shealey, the goals and all the positive aspects of the program are irrelevant. If you are a cop you are tainted with the sins of the hierarchy and your fellow officers, and a university should have nothing to do with you. Talk about the arrogance of youth!

DePaul, via an announcement from Provost Salma Ghanem has made the right decision by refusing to discontinue the academic program for the Chicago Police Department, by not bowing to “cancel culture.” Yes, the Police Department needs to change, but it is not going to go away. What better way to improve it than educating the women and men whom we should expect to preserve and protect all of us?

Thank you, Provost Ghanem and DePaul University.

Illustration courtesy of: http://clipart-library.com/officer-cliparts.html

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Rudy Gobert
Donovan Mitchell
Kevin Durant
Malcolm Brogdon
Jabari Parker
Buddy Hield
Ezekiel Elliott
Von Miller
Sean Payton
Nick Watney
Cameron Champ
Novak Djokovic

Familiar names from basketball, football, golf and tennis. They’ve all been diagnosed with Covid-19. They’re the faces of the pandemic in sports. And those are only the ones we know about…the ones who were outed.

How about these:
Ten reported cases in the National Hockey League.
Forty reported cases in Major League Baseball.

And it’s not just in professional sports. How about college football:
Twenty-three cases at Clemson
Twelve at LSU
Six at the University of Houston
Thirteen at Texas

The major sports have been making plans to either start or continue their seasons. Baseball, basketball and hockey all look to get practices started shortly with games started at the end of July. Reality or pipe dreams? If you can’t control the virus while the world is under quarantine conditions, how will you be able to do it when the athletes are in close quarters? How can you keep your locker room safe? How do you avoid contact in sports where contact is an integral part of the game? If an individual game like golf, where it’s easier to keep social distancing, is having problems with Covid-19 outbreaks among it’s players and caddies, what chance does basketball or hockey have to keep their athletes safe?

There’s been lots of talk of basketball bubbles and hockey hub cities, but how secure will these facilities really be? Yesterday we heard about positive tests for Brogdon and Parker, but both have said they plan to join the bubble in Orlando. What could possibly go wrong with that?

Plus, what about the games and competition themselves? What if any of the major names get infected? What if half a team gets it? How about if a hockey team loses both their goalies to the virus? When football begins, what will occur when some team loses it’s starting quarterback and he also infects his backup? Will all teams keep a third quarterback in a separate room as a precaution? So many complication, so few answers.

And don’t get me started about how colleges are going to put their student-athletes, who are not getting paid, at risk so the institution can make money!

Money is the keyword to all of this. Teams and players are both losing it in bunches if the games aren’t played. It’s understandable that all sides want to cut their losses as much as possible. But how much more would they lose if they get started and can’t play more than a few games, much less finish the year.

And how devastating would it be to any sport if someone died?!

Look, I miss sports as much as anyone. I’m tired of watching game shows to fill the time I would normally devote to some sport. I’m tired of watching games from ten years ago that I didn’t care that much about back then. Having sports back would also give out a signal that life is getting back to normal, but it would be a false signal. We are far from being back to normal. We’re seeing spikes in Covid-19 cases and hospitalizations. The national numbers are the worst they’ve been in more than two months. The outcomes that could go wrong are much worse than good feelings we’ll get from seeing our favorite team and athletes play. It’s just not the time to start playing games….not yet.

I can wait until 2021. Another few months won’t kill me or anyone else. I’m not sure we can say that if the games start too soon.

Related Post: Five reasons why college football is better than the NFL

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Four years ago I started writing this weekly post believing that sharing the experiences I encountered on the journey to Elderhood would help others traveling the path behind me.

I’ve been distracted along the way, diverted by the country’s social unrest, a divisive political arena, my antipathy for the president and of course, most recently, the Coronavirus pandemic and the shock waves that shook America to the core after the George Floyd tragedy exposed the legacy of racism that slavery drilled into the country’s bedrock.

But amidst the chaos I kept learning what it takes to ease the anxiety and occasional anguish that accompanies aging, the years rolling by like that last digit on a fast turning odometer. It’s been eye-opening, and heart-opening.

As I look back, I think the process starts when your weight is at its highest and your spirits are at their lowest. Maybe it’s after a sleepless night when you got up four times to take a pee and finally scheduled a roto rooter job at the urologist. You just had to face it, buddy boy, you are not the man you used to be!

The corollary is you can’t do the things you used to do! Which brings you to the first step to obtaining the added joy and meaning in life that I’m promising: determining what you can do, and within that parameter, what you want to do.

Here’s how that went for me. (I’m plowing old ground here, but the weeds keep coming up and must be pulled out repeatedly.)

First, there was the come to Jesus moment when I sucked it up and resolved to be done with the past. I had told myself a thousand times before that, it was impossible to re-write happy endings to ill-fated history. Still, I kept trying and you know the definition of someone who does the same thing again and again and expects a different result. But approaching Elderhood, it was high time, long overdue, to stop my futile effort to change how others lived their lives. If I were to have peace moving forward, I knew I had to set up impenetrable boundaries to keep guilt and regret at bay. Warning: this is not easy. There is emotional pain and deep sadness attached, but the past cannot be recreated.

Second, having come to appreciate the meaning of ‘be here, now,’ I learned how to see and be grateful for the moment itself, as it was, not as I wished it could be. For me it meant a new definition of ‘surrender,’ not as giving up and throwing in the towel, but as accepting the reality of “what is” at every given second. And even better, making that second into a peaceful moment, a happy moment, an intimate moment, a creative moment… I had the choice!

Third, I began to distinguish between behavior prompted by ego, and behavior inspired by my better self, the former seeking applause, the latter an inner happiness. I came to an intuitive awareness that there was something going on in a realm outside my normal perception of space and time. And I learned how to enter that dominion to find inner peace and the answers to all those questions that made sophomore year a haze of marijuana smoke.

I do suggest you give meditation a try. I’ll pique your curiosity with this come on: you’ve heard the phrase “see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wildflower.” It all comes clear when you sit cross-legged on a zafu cushion and free yourself from the myth of self-importance.

Here’s how I have it figured:

The moment D. Trump heard (remember, he doesn’t read) that African Americans and us elders suffered a disproportionate share of Covid 19 eradication, his demonic calculus got kick-started.  The math informed him  that by his encouraging Americans (by personal example,  strong suggestion and premature business openings) to  scuttle the CDC guidelines regarding masks and social distancing,  his clueless cult would wind up  merely taking  ill and recovering , while a great multitude of African Americans and many of those pesky seniors   (who have deduced that he is hell-bent on whittling away Social Security and demolishing Medicare) would perish, thus vanish from the voter rolls.

Naturally, this typically-Trumpian, daft, twisted, evil strategy backfired. For an obvious reason. The overwhelming majority of African-Americans knows that madman Trump  is a chronic deceiver, a congenital liar and an ignorant lout.  So naturally, most of them are predisposed to ignore his pernicious encouragements. Hence, most any African Americans who may not have been heeding  all the guidelines, were quick to don masks and keep  safe distances. And so, Trump, in a strangely distorted, unwitting way,  doubtlessly saved a number of black lives.

Meantime, Trump’s addictive need for in-person adoration  inexorably led him to assemble crowded blocs of maskless oafs,  consequently putting all of them in harm’s way, and many perhaps at death’s door.

Bottom line:  It’s highly probable that Trump  unintentionally removed a huge procession of his supporters from the voting lines, while inspiring a huge parade of African Americans to become even more determined to boot his swollen hindquarters out of office via the ballot box.

My dad was a firefighter.  He was passionate about his job which he considered a CAREER.  A CAREER of service to his fellow man for not only battling the inferno that most would run from but also for his community spirit.  Firemen are known for helping out with food and blood drives, teaching fire safety by speaking to youth in schools, and reaching out to the populace on media during Fire Prevention Week – all of the above was part of his routine.

And I’ll never forget the day, (December 1, 1958) that my father, on his day off, reported for duty to help out with the grisly task of removing the bodies of children caught in the Our Lady of Angels fire that took some 95 lives.  It was the worst school fire in the history of Chicago.  That fire deeply touched my dad and he had a hard time shaking the images burned into his mind by the tragic loss of life that didn’t have to occur had common sense been employed – making students egress when they still had a chance rather than closing up the classroom doors and praying for a miracle.   My father would often say, “God helps those who help themselves,” and he never understood why the adults failed to abide by that mantra and employ common sense.

As a boy, his formal education ended upon his graduation from grammar school.  He was expected to help his parents and go to work…that was common sense at that time since life for many immigrants was rough.  However, the man continued to read and educate himself through the power of literature and ascended to the rank of Battalion Chief (overseeing some 250 men in his district).  In order to make that grade, my dad had to take college classes regarding fire accelerants and public safety procedures.  He was at the top of his class – no surprise to his children and his wife, our mother.

Common sense often trumps book learning.  Common sense is a blessing for anyone because it allows those with little or no education to thrive and stay safe in a world that is at times cruel.

We live in such a world right now faced with a pandemic virus that doesn’t care how young or old you are, that doesn’t care about your politics, that doesn’t take into account your creed or religion.  The virus only cares about its own survival which often leads to the demise of a host that may not be in good health or might indeed be healthy but for whatever reason, can’t fight off the debilitating effects of COVID-19.

Worldwide cases now number some 9.4 million infections with 482,000 deaths globally and in the U.S. 121,000 plus.

That’s why I had to shake my head and wonder why would the leader of our nation threaten to defund COVID-19 testing sites, which include some 7 sites in Texas where the virus is surging?  My father would definitely question that finding it a total lack of common sense.

God bless those who utilize COMMON SENSE because it often allows people to GO DO GOOD even if like the Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz 

they feel inadequate and seek summa cum laude validation for that which they already have – a BRAIN filled with COMMON SENSE.